User Reviews

Overall Rating:

Value Rating:

Submitted by
Chappy

Date Reviewed: November 3, 2014

Strengths: The biggest strength of this bike has to be the 'feel'. Being old school (with the required grey hairs for proof) I came kicking & screaming from a hard tail to full suss. Admittedly it was from a Gary Fisher to a Gary Fisher so that the impact of the change was diminished a little. The 'old' steed was a Gary Fisher Supercalibre 'SAAB'. Just felt at one with the bike, knew how it would behave and wasn't till I went out on a long bumpy 45 kilometre trail that I noticed how often I was standing on downhills while the other guy was seated and pedalling hard, I was feeling the tail of my bike flick and bob around beneath me as I absorbed the constant changes thru my knees and shoulders and watched the tail of the other guy stay glued to the track, that I contemplated the change. I bought the Roscoe secondhand but if you could spot any sign of wear anywhere on the frame you'd have better eyes than I and I'm fussy about my bikes. It is a Roscoe 11 but upgraded with Sram XO & an XTR crankset. Getting back to it strengths, it was how quickly this bike met the standard of the old mare and surpassed it. It holds the lines you choose to perfection, takes the unexpected as if it's been there before and as Buzz puts it in Toy Story ' this isn't flying it's falling with style'. I don't think I've had another bike, road or MTB, that became 'the trusted steed' so quickly. 26" vs 27.5" vs 29" who cares, you can argue pro's and con's with the proponent's of each till your out of breath, at the end of the day it comes down to the feel, the ride it gives you and the smile that inevitably follows that counts.

Weaknesses: Bit disappointed at how quickly the bearing at the rear suss pivot point needed replacing but as stated the bike was secondhand and while in pristine condition 2nd hand is 2nd hand so I will wait to see how long the replacement lasts before I call it a weakness. Main weakness has sadly got to be the rider - this is a better bike than I am a rider but the bonus is it's making me a better rider because of the confidence it inspires.

Bottom Line:

Like most others have already said, and I know I've joined the conversation very late in the piece but I love this bike. Nothing I like more than a functional piece of art, and in my considered opinion that is what this bike is! Like art there will be new movements, styles and innovations come along over time (as there has been already since this bike hit the market till now in 2014 and my writing of this review! man that went quickly!!) but again as in art the exceptional will still be admired even as time moves on. Kudos to Gary Fisher and whoever else was involved in it's evolution

Overall Rating:

Value Rating:

Submitted by
Leon Van der Veen
a All Mountain Rider

Date Reviewed: October 8, 2012

Strengths: great GF steering, nice package, easy set up, floats in the air and lands like a superb dirt bike, climbs fast and easy, no extra fussy linkage, so nice details and finish, unbelievable grip and tracking with Nevegals, super fast XC use with XC race tires, feels like a custom race set up with minimal tuning, makes good rider rip & poor rider keep up, really is the best bike I have ever ridden. Love the so-cool offset spoke set up, makes a stronger, straighter rear wheel. Thanks GF!

Fisher, now Trek, HAVE to be losing money on every lower end Roscoe. These materials and parts cost even if you make/buy hundreds. No wonder Trek dropped the Roscoe. That frame material is spooky close to recent high-perf cost-no-object aircraft parts. Only the axles, brake pads and grips are low budget. Even then I can`t bend an axle, so they will do for a while yet!
If you really do use chair lifts a lot buy a heavier package. Big guys and most others can not do better than a Roscoe for most other riding. Though that Cannondale sure was fast on XC trails. The easy susp set up is a MUST DO before you start. Don`t mind a little drifting, it`ll hook up again.

Strengths: Overall a fantanstic , quality bike. I've rode it hard , and crashed it harder and have had no problems with it. I've not had to do much work on it, probably due to the first owner speccing it out with the below upgrades.
I love the geometry, I'm 5ft 7' and 146 lbs , the small frame fits perfect. The wide bars put you in a great aggressive position for attacking the down hills and it climbs beautifully as well. A complete all round bike, light but very sturdy so it can handle tough rocky descents.

Weaknesses: swing arm thingy that attaches rear shock to frame was replaced under garrantee. It seems that there has been no thought into the cable routing which is annoying considering the price of this bike.

Bottom Line:

I love this bike, I'm still growing into it. It's very capable and you just want to keep pushing yourself on the downhills. Afterall you don't know your limit till you fall off! :) The way the bike feels when you ride it is like the bike becomes an extention of yourself and inspires confidence. The cost new is scarey but keep your eye out on the second hand market. I can't see myself changing it for another full sus. bike, just going to replace parts as they wear out.

Similar Products Used: SC Heckler. Let me say I have always been a huge Heckler fan. I sold my Heckler and bought the Roscoe.

Bike Setup: Stock. Love the x-o group. Maxxis Ardents. Went for the Joplin remote post. Highly recommend it. Had to cut a hair off the bars to handle the narrow UP singletrack.

Overall Rating:

Value Rating:

Submitted by
drunuts
a Weekend Warrior
from Northfield, NH, USA

Date Reviewed: March 18, 2011

Strengths: The ABP and fox float give this bike a bottomless feel. It took me a ride or two to get used to the geometry, but once I felt comfortable, it is a real confidence booster. The frame's shape allows you to move and groove in the cockpit to easily shift your weight around. Nice wide handlebars for stability. Shimano hollow tech bottom bracket and cane creek headset makes for smooth bearing rotation and easy maintenance. The avid brakes are perfect for one finger braking. Super fast! Super fun!

Weaknesses: The tires!! Get em off! Also, the retail price is ridiculous. I was lucky to find it barely used at an awesome price.

Bottom Line:

Gotta climb for those down hills! Why not take it easy on yourself?! This is PERFECT for the all around ups and downs of your local single track.

Strengths: Light, Seemingly endless travel due to the Dual Chamber shock. G2 geometry inspires the ride. ABP makes a noticable difference. Nice components. Solid feeling bike, very comfortable right out of the box

Weaknesses: No longer offered in the 2011 GF line up due to the redundancy of the Trek Remedy line

Bottom Line:

This bike JAMS. I can't wait for the next ride. It is too bad that GF is not going to offer the roscoe in 2011, because it is the perfect solution between the Trek Remedy, and the GF Hi-Fi.
Handling is unreal, it is so quick that it allows you to push it further in the turns. Love it.

Strengths: Good climber and great on down hills. Propedal works great for climbing and the active suspension while breaking on down hills is awsome.

Weaknesses: None so far.

Bottom Line:

I bought this bike as an upgrade to an older Trek fuel that I have. I was wanting a bike with more suspension that could still climb well. In getting the used demo model I was able to get an upgraded bike that is probably more than I need at a good price. So far I have been really pleased with this bike. With the propedal feature this bike climbs better than my old bike and if it is any heavier I really cant tell at all. On the down hills the bike is great. The G2 geometry with the suspension and ABP have really increased my confidence and Ive already been able to clear some areas that I was not able to in the past. Anyone who is looking for a solid all mountain bike wont go wrong with the Roscoe.

So far very happy with my Roscoe. I received it as a frame replacement for my HiFi, after tacoing the frame for the second season in a row. GF/Trek has been very good to me!

Anyways, built with the upgraded parts that were donated from my '07 HiFi Dlx, the build for my 19" Roscoe III frame came in at 28lbs even.

While I notice the extra weight going up hills from my former 26lb build HiFi, this bike pedals just as well. On technical ascents it is faster, simply because the rear end is better able to deal with trail trash like roots and rocks, while being epically more composed over ledges and logs. The travel adjust is necessary on long steep pitches where you have to pedal versus depending on momentum. While originally I was going to get a Float or go extreme with a 36 Van, I'm glad I was able to acquire the Roscoe II spec fork for that reason alone. I'm not sure how much the G2 offset helps or hinders, but the bike doesn't possess any painful wheel flop tendencies while moving slowly.

Going downhill is where the bike truly shines. While certainly capable for a such a large bike in the tight singletrack, blasting down switchbacks or chutes is where it comes into it's own. Steps that used to cause unintentional dismounts are swallowed whole. The slackish geometry (and giant DH bar) inspire confidence compared to its more XC sibling. Given my riding season weight of 225lbs, the HiFi would feel like riding 2 unicycles from frame flex when bombing through the river valley of Edmonton. The Roscoe is better equipped to deal with my physique. Sadly this newfound confidence is tempered by the 160mm rotors on the leftover Avid brakes, they are not able to hold their own in this weight class.

In summary: This makes for quite the fun bike to ride as a Clydesdale. It is not going to compete with lightweight XC whips on a racecourse. Nor is it the optimal choice for DH shuttle runs. However, it is not going to be embarrassed at either. I rode it for a solo 8hr marathon and for my laps at a 24hr. It was complete overkill for the course, but I was comfy and when tired it made up for my bike handling mistakes. It was entertaining for runs at Rabbit Hill, though I avoided any large drops or jumps. And I think that it fits a reasonable 1 bike quiver solution as long as you aren't racing in any specific discipline. On the down side, the cost new is obscene, and I don't look forward to replacing proprietary suspension parts. Neither the shock nor the fork are going to be hanging in your LBS.

Weaknesses: the bike retails for $5000 and doesn't come with tubeless rim strips or valves. the tires are pretty horrible. they have no side nobs. the only why they actually turn on anything less than hardpacked is if you run them at really low pressure (i was using (25~26psi). the fork blew out after about a month to where the talas feature didn't work at all. one last thing, a suspension bolt backed itself out after a few rides. this is a bolt that actually lived behind the chain stay, so you cant check it. needless to say, it backed into said chainstay. on the plus side, the chainstay and the bolt are now lighter as they both have had material shaved off. :) also, considering the type of bike that this is, it would have been nice to have top tube cable routing available for a seatpost remote.

Bottom Line:

I ride my mt bike almost everyday. Because of this, my race bike always seems to be in some sort of disrepair. So, i thought I’d invest in another bike. I wanted something different enough from my Scott spark to justify buying it....not that you really need to justify a new bike purchase. I did a bunch of research and the Roscoe was the closest thing to what I wanted. I test rode a 575, nice bike but the roscoe beat it out in several areas (more tire clearance, tapered headtube, ABP rear pivot, DRCV shock.....) and the new 5 spot was going to be a long wait.

I've very please with the roscoe. I’m 5'10". I bought a large and am running a little longer stem. I wanted it to still fit similar to my other mt bikes. It weighs in at a little over 29 lbs with the above set-up, minus the Joplin post.

The Roscoe climbs really well, and decends like crazy. I really don't use the talas feature on the fork unless I’m going up something really steep and I normally climb with the RP23 fully open (on trails). The avid brakes are superb. The power with the 185 front rotor is night and day as compared to my spark (xtr 160 rotors). The overall stiffness of the bike is also very good. The 28mm rims and 15mm thru axle combined with the tapered head tube on the fox fork makes for a bike that goes where you point it.

All said, this is a great bike. There are just a few minor issues that I’ve encountered.

Strengths: Nimble, light for spec/travel. White is the new black it looks great!

Weaknesses: Tyres not that great for wet roots which are typical of most of the local trails I ride. Have bought Bontrager Jones to upgrade to.

Bottom Line:

I wanted a change to my previous bike - more travel and a beefier bike. This is the one. I was initially looking at the Blur LT, but the price for high spec bike was just too much. The Roscoe 3 is the same price as the off the peg LT, but blows it out the water on components and hence weight.

I am looking forward to hitting some serious obstacles. As a middle aged rider, my wariness of hurting myself has increased over time! This bike gives me some more confidence!

Similar Products Used: Previous bike - Trek Liquid 25. Tested Roscoe against the Trek Fuel EX9.9 and an Ex8. Had also considered Blur LT.

Bike Setup: As spec, but will change tyres.

Overall Rating:

Value Rating:

Submitted by
Andy
a Weekend Warrior
from Fort Collins, CO

Date Reviewed: May 13, 2009

Strengths: S-T-I-F-F!!! love the frame, light for what it is at 28.4 lbs, the most simple, proven suspension design with innovative enhancements, top notch parts spec, Bontrager OEM parts beat similar stuff from Specialized, Race Face and only slightly behind Thomson, Rhythm wheels are excellent, Bontrager tubeless works better than the DT / Specialized stuff I used formerly, great new technologies in DCRV, RP24, tapered headtube, ABP, frame shape, super wide bars. This is an innovative, well thought out bike - and it works.

Weaknesses: Proprietary fork offset limits after market upgrades as does rear wheel spacing. If Trek / Fisher ever abandon ABP, compatible rear wheels could be a very big issue for the long-term. After several rides, I believe this is a non-issue but, on my first ride the derailleur hanger snapped in half with no visible impact to the derailleur. Since replacing, there have been no problems - probably just a minor QC issue with the parts contractor.

Bottom Line:

After just a few rides, this is an admittedly early review but so far, it's almost all good.

I like the fact that this bike isn't just another 67 degree HA / 73 degree SA long travel trailbike. Fisher uses some innovative engineering and geometry corrected parts to reach what seems to be the best possible compromise between agile climber and confident descender.

With other bikes of this genre, it always seems that the design either favors climbing (for instance, the Enduro) or descending (for instance, the Nomad). Unfortunately, this always comes at a large cost to going the other direction (for instance, I don't think the Enduro descends as well as it climbs - not even close). This bike seems to cut it right down the middle. It honestly climbs as well as it descends and I think it does so largely because of the out-of-the-box engineering found in the super wide bars, strange fork offset and other minor tweaks found throughout this bike.

I won't go too far in to it with this review as it's early season, the trails are super tacky and I'm still in ski-season shape but, so far, I'm very impressed with Fisher stuff and this bike in particular. I love my HiFi 29er but needed something a little more fire road climb friendly (Fisher if you're reading this, us old guys need a 29er specific drivetrain.)

I'll post again in a month or two but, if you're considering this bike, I don't think you'll be disappointed in the least. I was never a Gary Fisher guy but between this and the HiFi 29er, they seem to be on top of their game in the two most popular categories - trailbikes and 29ers.

Related Roscoe III Forum Posts

Hello,
I just bought a new old stock Roscoe III and took it out on two short rides. I noticed that the rear suspension feels a bit dead and somewhere getting creaking noises. The rear shock appears to be losing air. I fill it with 200 lbs when starting, then when finished find it has bottomed ... Read More »

After breaking my HiFi+ chain stays for the third time in 14 months, my LBS got GF to replace the frame. I'm getting a 2010 Roscoe III frame and rear shock. Everything else will be coming from my HiFi+. Seems like a good deal. Is there anything I should be concerned about?
The only potential ... Read More »

This is probably a stupid question, but I've notice in pictures of 09' Roscoe III's on the internet that the welds conecting the top tube to the seat tube are diffrent. My only guess is that one of them is XL and needs to be reenfored more due to a longer seat tube. Or perpabse one of the pictures ... Read More »

GOAL: I'd like to improve & spice up my general XC riding by riding faster over the rough, tight & technical stuff and adding bigger jumps and drop offs, without losing control.
QUESTIONS: To everyone who already tested both model series:
1.) Which is the most FUN bike? Why?
2.) Do the ProPedal ... Read More »

Welp. Rode the Roscoe III today, and it was pretty good. From my years of Moto-X trail riding, it really reminded me of my dirtbike, especially when compared back to back with the much faster/nimble EX9.9 Carbon that i rode later today. The trails we rode were really covered in leaves, so it was har ... Read More »